CHENNAI: Three people have been arrested by the Tamil Nadu Cyber Crime police on charges of swindling Rs 3.84 crore from a man in a digital arrest scam.

According to the police, the arrested were identified as Mathangi Harish Babu (34), Logesh (30), and S Afroz (31). The police said that Harish was a mule account holder who earned Rs 1 lakh by selling his account, while Logesh, a mule account agent, confessed to providing two bank accounts to operators. Afroz, an operator, utilized trading agencies to convert illegally obtained money, allegedly for tax evasion purposes, the police said.

The police said that the victim received a call from the fraudster posing as an official from the Directorate of Enforcement, falsely accusing them of involvement in money laundering through use of their Aadhaar card. The fraudster threatened the complainant with an arrest warrant and also sent a fabricated copy.

The victim was subjected to an online interrogation and instructed to transfer Rs 3.84 crores to a ‘supervision account’ to be freed from the charges. Believing the fraudster, the victim transferred funds in several instalments.

Realising later they were scammed, the victim filed a complaint on the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal. After analysing the bank account to which the money was sent, the police traced the trio.